An interesting reference is this: High, W. M. (1990). Editing Changes to Monographic Cataloging Records in the OCLC Database: An Analysis of the Practice in Five University Libraries. PhD thesis, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
It's in UMI (and Heavy Trussed). Simon On Aug 28, 2012, at 12:05 PM, Galen Charlton wrote: > Hi, > > On 08/27/2012 04:36 PM, Karen Coyle wrote: >> I also assumed that Ed wasn't suggesting that we literally use github as >> our platform, but I do want to remind folks how far we are from having >> "people friendly" versioning software -- at least, none that I have seen >> has felt "intuitive." The features of git are great, and people have >> built interfaces to it, but as Galen's question brings forth, the very >> *idea* of versioning doesn't exist in library data processing, even >> though having central-system based versions of MARC records (with a >> single time line) is at least conceptually simple. > > What's interesting, however, is that at least a couple parts of the concept > of distributed version control, viewed broadly, have been used in traditional > library cataloging. > > For example, RLIN had a concept of a "cluster" of MARC records for the same > title, with each library having their own record in the cluster. I don't > know if RLIN kept track of previous versions of a library's record in a > cluster as it got edited, but it means that there was the concept of a > "spatial" distribution of record versions if not a temporal one. I've never > used RLIN myself, but I'd be curious to know if it provided any tools to > readily compare records in the same cluster and if there were any mechanisms > (formal or informal) for a library to grab improvements from another > library's record and apply it to their own. > > As another example, the MARC cataloging source field has long been used, > particularly in central utilities, to record institution-level attribution > for changes to a MARC record. I think that's mostly been used by catalogers > to help decide which version of a record to start from when copy cataloging, > but I suppose it's possible that some catalogers were also looking at the > list of modifying agencies ("library A touched this record and is > particularly good at subject analysis, so I'll grab their 650s"). > > Regards, > > Galen > -- > Galen Charlton > Director of Support and Implementation > Equinox Software, Inc. / The Open Source Experts > email: g...@esilibrary.com > direct: +1 770-709-5581 > cell: +1 404-984-4366 > skype: gmcharlt > web: http://www.esilibrary.com/ > Supporting Koha and Evergreen: http://koha-community.org & > http://evergreen-ils.org